Thousands of Italians fast for Salvini

(ANSA) - Bologna, January 21 - Some 5,000 Italians on Tuesday fasted in support of League leader Matteo Salvini after a Senate panel voted to send him to trial for allegedly kidnapping some 100 migrants on board a coast guard ship last July.
    "I thank you because there are 5,000 Italian women and men who are fasting today, who are giving up their breakfast, lunch and dinner as a sign of sympathy and protest," said the nationalist opposition leader and former interior minister.
    "It will do me good, perhaps (TV chat show host Lili) Gruber will stop saying I've got a big belly".
    "Today I'm fasting in the name of an Italy which must have the right to defend its borders, its jobs, its culture, its beauty, its history, itself security and its identity," said the populist strongman.
    "Because for me blocking clandestine immigration was not a right but a duty.
    "If that is a crime for the (ruling centre-left Democratic Party) PD and for some judges, try me and arrest me".
    The Senate panel vote, which is not the final say in the case, came after the PD and its ruling partner the 5-Star Movement (M5S) boycotted the vote and Salvini's League members of the committee voted in favour of their leader standing trial.
    The Senate will now vote on lifting his parliamentary immunity to face the kidnapping charges in a full session on February 17.
    The ruling majority has accused Salvini of wanting to play the victim and martyr in the case to boost his already high poll numbers, ahead of crunch regional elections in Emilia Romagna on Sunday.
    Salvini's centre right allies voted against him facing trial, while the M5S and PD boycotted the vote after he ordered his own members to vote to put him on trial.